USA TODAY: Strikeforce boss prepares for 'bittersweet' end

Strikeforce, the fight promotion that began as a kickboxing organization and transformed into one of the UFC’s fiercest competitors before UFC’s parent company, Zuffa, bought it out in early 2011, will air a final event on Showtime (10 p.m. ET/PT) from Oklahoma City.

The UFC will absorb many of its fighters, and the Strikeforce name will drift off into MMA history.

It’s a bittersweet ending, says Strikeforce founder and CEO Scott Coker, who got his start promoting martial arts events in 1985 while working part time as a Bay Area karate instructor and attending classes at West Valley College in northern California. At the time, Coker says, he knew nothing about being a fight promoter, “but I felt confident I could go out and sell some tickets.”

He never guessed that 27 years later he’d be watching the organization he created take its final bow on the national stage.

Strikeforce’s journey into the MMA world began in March 2006, when it promoted the first MMA event in California after the state athletic commission officially adopted the sport.

The promotion initially planned for about 6,000 spectators at San Jose’s HP Pavilion, Coker says, “but it just kept growing and growing.”

Before organizers knew it, more than 18,000 fans had poured in to see former UFC champion Frank Shamrock battle Cesar Gracie.

At first, Strikeforce’s ambitions were strictly local. It operated mainly out of HP Pavilion, also home of the NHL’s San Jose Sharks. Near the end of 2007, when the Sharks owners at Silicon Valley Sports and Entertainment Inc. expressed an interest in buying a 50 percent ownership stake in Strikeforce, Coker saw the opportunity to create something bigger.

In 2009, Strikeforce, with help from its new partner, purchased fighter contracts and an existing TV deal with CBS and Showtime from struggling MMA promoter ProElite.

“That’s when I think Strikeforce became a national promotion and basically went from four shows a year in our local arena here to 16 events a year all over the country,” Coker says.

Soon Strikeforce signed marquee fighters such as Fedor Emelianenko and Dan Henderson, and launched an ambitious heavyweight tournament that pitted some of the sport’s best big men against each other.

But when Zuffa made an offer to buy out its largest competitor, Coker says his partners felt it was time to get out of the MMA business and refocus on hockey. UFC President Dana White initially promised it would be business as usual at Strikeforce after the sale. Now, a little less than two years later, Strikeforce’s TV deal is expiring, and its doors are set to close after Saturday’s last hurrah.

“I think this is a good way to close the chapter, and it’s something that I’m going to celebrate,” Coker says. “I’ve been in the fight business 27 years. That’s a long time, a long run, and I’m going to celebrate this.”

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